LESSON FOUR. Just some decades ago, neither laser installations nor the very word laser were in existence

Text В

Just some decades ago, neither laser installations nor the very word laser were in existence. Today, lasers are used in electronics, medicine, engineering, communications, the automobile and aircraft industry, agricultural machine building, and other fields of the economy and science. But the field of laser applications is expanding very rapidly. Let us point out only a few new uses of the laser.

Lasers have wide-ranging technological uses. In the production of electronic components lasers are used in such operations as micro welding, resistor trimming, etc., something that can be performed perfectly well today.

Laser radiation has the property of selective excitation of atoms and molecules, enabling laser isolation of isotopes. The first successful experiment in separating isotopes by laser was performed at the Institute of Spectroscopy of the USSR Academy of Sciences, in 1972. This work is regarded by specialists as highly promising for power engineering and production of extrapure materials.

The use of laser technology has considerably increased the resolution and sensitivity of the spectroscopic methods.

Without the laser beam, there could be no optical electronics which computer specialists see as a highly promising direction for making high-performance and small-size computers. Optical electronic instruments for recording, storing and processing information use a laser beam.

Lasers can quickly record and read out information, with recording density being 100 times higher than in the most advanced magnetic system. It is evident that in the near future centralized archives will be set up allowing us to display any required information on a home TV screen.

We have succeeded in designing a new information carrier which can be used for multiple recording of light signals, similar to the magnetic tape recording.

Great importance is attached today to the use of lasers in medicine. Lasers have been successfully used in eye treatment.

Thus the laser today comes in handy in solving process and quality control problems, in medicine, communications and computer technology. It can do hundreds of jobs; the number has been constantly increasing, and before long, the laser will become a customary and indispensable assistant in most professions.

Projects are now being discussed in scientific literature of using high-power lasers for long-distance space communications. These projects have not yet been put into effect, primarily because of the great technological difficulties and, therefore, of the great cost involved. But there is no doubt, that in time, these projects will be realized and the laser beam will begin operating in outer space as well.

III. Answer the following questions:

1. Where are lasers used today? 2. The field of laser applications is extending very rapidly, isn't it? 3. Where do lasers have wide-ranging technological uses? 4. In what fields is the use of lasers highly promising? 5. What projects are now being discussed in scientific literature?

IV. Give the main points of text В in 3-5 sentences.

V. Speak about the new uses of the laser.

I. Look through the list of English words and their Russian equivalents. You will need them for better understanding text C:

thermonuclear fusion – термоядерная реакция, термоядерный синтез; to condense – конденсировать; сгущать; evolvement – развитие; создание; exploration – исследование; target – мишень, цель; angle reflector – угловой отражатель; incident – падающий; reverse – обратный, противоположный; range – дальность; geodetic – геодезический; precision – точность.

II. Read the following text carefully. While you are reading look for the answers to the questions:

1. What idea have specialists of the quantum radiophysics laboratory suggested? 2. How is the distance to the Moon measured?

Text С

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